Face Your Imperfect SelfTake Away Points:1. No one is perfect. The only person who is perfect in this world is “God.” (If you believe in there is a power bigger than any one of us.) However, do you know how many times a second God hears people complaining about him? (“God, why did you let this happen to me?”)2. The things you judge yourself for not being perfect only proves that you are a true human being.3. You are courageous to face your imperfect self. There is a bravery in you and please acknowledge it.4. Your disappointment, shame, guilt, or helplessness about your behavior is not who you are. That’s how you judge yourself. You are bigger than this judgment.5. Anyone, including yourself, whose judgment about you, is not the reflection of who you are. It’s the reflection of themselves. (Please see “Truth about others.”
6. Turning helpless and shame into compassionate action to ourselves or other help to bring each one of us out. (More to come in the next segment. Also, please see this entry of “love yourself.”)

Self-Reflection Activities

1. Was there anything you did that make you feel ashamed of yourself in the last 30 days?2. What did “shame” feel like to you? Identify your physical and emotional sensations as your cue for the future3. Write a letter to yourself to explain to yourself why you did what you did at the time.4. Then, write a reply letter to the first letter to forgive yourself. In this letter, make it very clear for the following points:
1) You understand the shame that you are currently experiencing (the physical and emotional experiences).
2) How has the shame have controlled you in the past 30 days?
3) Identify the reasons why the choices you made at the time wasn’t the best choice.
4) Provide your understanding of the choices you made and use these reasons to forgive yourself.
5) come up an action plan by either rectify the mistakes if possible or what to do differently next time that will make you feel proud of yourself.

Let’s take Sheri as an example. Her incident would be running away from the traffic accident. She was so scared and ashamed of herself that she ran away (#1). In her case, she would write a letter to herself and explained to herself why she chose to run away at that time (#2). Then, she would write a letter to forgive herself, to rectify her mistakes, and to come up an action plan for the next time.

This exercise might elicit different feelings that “feels like” hard to tolerate. If it brings up a lot of emotions that are hard to tolerate, talk to a friend or seek professional help. You might be on the verge to reconcile a very difficult memory or traumatic event. Don’t bury it away. On the other side of the fear is your courageous inner strength that is waiting for you to dig out.